The present invention relates to a gravity feed merchandise apparatus, and more particularly to such an apparatus for display and dispensing of consumer product items, e.g. in first-in-first-out manner, that is formed of a plurality of side by side units, each having a holder with a vertical series of gravity feed product chutes open at one side for ready access, and a suspension mechanism to mount the holder on a support for independent movement from a retracted display and dispensing position to an extended, open access restocking position.
Known constructions that display and dispense merchandise items in a retail shopping area, e.g. along an aisle of a drug store, supermarket, etc., often involve gravity feed units in which the product items are fully exposed on an inclined stationary shelf, taking up extra space, fostering random selection and making restocking difficult as the old items must be rearranged at the front of the shelf before adding fresh stock therebehind to favor selection of the old items first. Orderly restocking is important with food and like items that deteriorate with age.
Other known gravity feed units provide the product items on an inclined, drawer-like, single pull-out shelf arranged to expose only the front items to foster their orderly selection first, but this requires a cumbersome drawer-slide type construction to enable the shelf to be slid out to expose from above its rear portion for restocking thereat.
These known units are mainly permanent and inflexible, with shelves of prefixed aisle width that limit side by side accommodation thereon of different product item types, and adjustment of the display width to match variations in allotted aisle width.
While it is desired to arrange these units for attractive product item display and ready access by consumers, yet conform the units to varying width retail areas, existing constructions do not provide versatile combination arrangements, changeable in width pattern to accommodate a mixture of differing width side by side product items along a given aisle width of the retail area.
A need exists for a merchandise apparatus to display and dispense consumer product items, that overcomes these drawbacks, and permits consumer access for orderly item dispensing as well as ready access for efficient restocking, e.g. in first-in-first-out manner, utilizing any desired number of units of the same or different width in side by side arrangement, each storing and displaying given size items in compact, segregated arrangement.